Afghanistan: Peacekeeping Operations

Liam Fox: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many  (a) suicide bombings and  (b) improvised explosive device attacks were recorded in Afghanistan in each month since February 2008.

Des Browne: Records of incidents for the whole of Afghanistan are not held centrally and could not be provided without incurring disproportionate cost.
	Data are more readily available for attacks within Regional Command (South), which includes the majority of UK forces deployed to Afghanistan.
	Between 1 February and 12 June 2008, there were a total of 176 improvised explosive device attacks recorded in RC(S), and 21 suicide or suicide vehicle-borne improvised explosive device attacks. These data are broken down per month as follows:
	
		
			  Month  Total IED attacks (including suicide-borne)  Suicide-borne IED attacks 
			 February 2008 31 4 
			 March 2008 52 1 
			 April 2008 40 8 
			 May 2008 35 4 
			 June 2008 18 4 
		
	
	These figures do not include IED finds with no detonation or IED false alarms. These data are based on information derived from a number of sources and can only be an estimate, not least because of the difficulties in ensuring a consistent interpretation of the basis for collating statistics in a complex fast-moving multinational operational environment.